How to Double Sales

Does that title sound like a gimmick? It’s not. It’s about the numbers. If you truly want to double your sales, you simply need to double a key aspect of your sales performance, asserts Stephan Schiffman, sales trainer and prolific author, in his newest book, Sales Essentials (Adams Media, 2008). His advice is rooted in the theory that when you measure and focus on a certain area, you’ll see improvement in that area. Here, he says, are five ways you can double your sales:

1. Double your calls. Can you double the number of calls you make? If so, you can stop reading. Double your calls and, assuming everything else remains constant, you’ll double your sales. For most salespeople, however, this isn’t a realistic option. But what if you boosted your call volume by a little? Say you make 30 calls a day. Next week, try adding just three more calls a day; you’ll boost your sales by 10 percent. Once 33 calls a day is comfortable, try bumping it up again. Gradually, you’ll see some significant gains in your sales – and your income.
2. Get through more often. On a typical day, Schiffman calls 15 people and gets through to seven. He acknowledges that getting through to 14 people might be tough, but if he really focused on this area and figured out how to reach people with greater consistency, maybe he could increase his “getting through” numbers to eight or nine a day. Significant? You bet. In a year, that’s an additional 200 to 400 people he’s going to reach.
3. Get more appointments. Schiffman speaks to seven people a day and typically gets one appointment. What if he could get two? Theoretically, he’d double his sales. But even small increases, say 1.2 appointments for every seven calls, can make a dramatic difference.
4. Close more sales. You’re probably thinking, “Duh!” but look at the numbers. Schiffman’s closing ratio is one out of eight. What if he could start closing one out of seven? Or one out of six? If everything else stayed constant and this ratio improved, his sales would improve. Your challenge is to determine whether closing provides your best opportunity for doubling your income. If your closing ratio is already pretty good, probably not. But if you lag behind your peers here, this may be a good area on which to shine a spotlight.
5. Generate more dollars per sale. You need to know your customers’ share of wallet here. If they’re not spending 100 percent of the budget they’ve allocated for your kind of product or service with your company, you have an opportunity to sell more. Schiffman recalls the time a woman called him at 10:00 p.m. on a Friday night to order 10 copies of one of his books. He asked why she was calling so late and after she explained her company was trying to help its 10 distributors sell more, Schiffman suggested they meet in person. That $80 book order blossomed into a $250,000 program.

Do you know your numbers? You need to, says Schiffman, but that’s only the starting point. Once you know them, the question is: What are you going to do differently? Many reps don’t know. And if you don’t know, you can’t double your sales.

For more ideas, visit www.dei-sales.com.

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